


Cause and Effect

by SnowMercury



Series: Another Day In MonsterFalls [1]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Dermatillomania, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-05
Updated: 2018-11-05
Packaged: 2019-08-19 04:52:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16527740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnowMercury/pseuds/SnowMercury
Summary: Quick one-shot, the ship is only implied & can be ignored because its platonic fluff, Ford has dermatillomania and so does the OC.(Before first break is preportal, between first and second breaks is in the portal, after the second is post portal. Works with my reader-insert Monsterfalls AU fic!) (Also i know silicone bracelets werent popularized until either 2001 or 2004 ploys...... suspension of disbelief)(does not need to be read with/before Just Another Day, it stands alone!)





	Cause and Effect

“Ford! It’s taking a bit long for you to finish sketching that one flower, it looked cool but not that- oh.” 

Blinking out of thought as he looked down at the flower, journal balanced on his knee as he sat there, Ford realized a couple things. One, that there was blood on his fingers (had he been picking again? he hadn’t even noticed) and two, that David had seen it. Keeping his focus on the flower, he rubbed the blood on his cheek and fingers until it was nearly unnoticeable- except for, well, the slight cut. 

“It’s nothing, just caught a mosquito, nothing to worry about.” And it  _would_ be nothing to worry about. He was working on it. Turning back to the sketch of the flower he had finished a few moments ago (those moments of idle looking without purposefully using his hands, that must have caused it), he didn’t look over at his friend. Surely this moment of- of weakness could be forgotten; he didn’t want to have to explain this to David. That would be too much. 

David moved over, the orange-furred creature sitting down next to Ford and looking at the flower. It grew at the base of a tree, a redwood. He waited a moment, before looking to Ford. 

“I get it. It’s something I’ve.... Struggled with, also. It isn’t as noticeable on freshwater sirens because of the fur, but that doesn’t... Don’t worry about this changing what I think of you, is what I mean.” He pulled at one of his silicone bracelets, squishing it between his claws as he spoke. “I usually occupy my hands with a bracelet, or a piece of grass, or flower petals- and I try to keep busy doing other things. It’s hard to do when you feel like there’s something uneven or wrong with your skin, that you have to fix it, but distracting myself usually helps me. Here,” he takes one of his bracelets off, a light and dark blue patterned one, and hands it to Ford, “feel free to keep this, I have plenty more and if I run out, I know how to make more. But, maybe it’ll help?” David smiles, tilting his head to the side slightly, hoping he hadn’t said anything wrong. 

Ford accepts the bracelet, looking down at it, squishing it between his fingers as he thinks. With his other hand he closes his journal and keeps looking at the bracelet, throat gone dry. His heart had been racing not too long ago, worried about every word David had been saying. Now, looking down at the bracelet, he feels a rush of relief at not facing another betrayal from a friend for his ‘oddness’. “Thank you. I..... It means a lot. That you don’t think less of me, for this.” 

“That’d be hypocritical of me.”

Ford shrugs. “People have been hypocritical about me before.”

David pauses for a moment, thinking about what to say in response to that. Ford seems resigned to it, like it’s just another aspect of life, that other people have been nasty to him. “I could fight them. I have big enough teeth for it.”

Ford blinks in shock, reeling back slightly. “No, I don’t want to bring anything back from that time in my life. But, thank you for the offer.” He stands up, slipping the bracelet onto his hand and brushing himself off from sitting on the ground. “Now, I believe we said something earlier about going down to the lake?”

David grins, standing up quickly and almost jumping from moving so quickly. “Let’s do it!!! I can show you the cave system where I- oh, wait, no, can you breathe underwater? You need to breathe underwater to see it. I can show you the shore caves though!”

Ford grins, standing up straight. “I can’t breathe underwater now, but I’m sure I can figure something out! If not, CPR isn’t too hard to do, it’ll be fine.”

They walk towards the lake, leaving the flower behind.

 

——————

 

 Ford was looking at a shopkeeper’s wares, thinking about what he should buy. Should he focus on defense or food? Defense was certainly important, but without food then he could just starve, he didn’t know what the next dimension would have. It wasn’t like he had a lot of time to decide, either- the bazaar ended at sunrise, and if he wanted to get enough sleep to not be sleep deprived he’d have to decide soon. Either choice would be a gamble. In his focus, he hardly realized how much he was fiddling with his bracelet- until it tore, worn down from months of messing with it instead of picking at his skin. 

He tensed up, rubbing it between his fingers and idly realizing he couldn’t keep it on his wrist anymore. He couldn’t give it any more thought than that at this moment, or he’d get caught up in missing his dimension yet again. So he slipped it into his pocket and made a decision- two charges for his lazer gun, and three days worth of supplies. It’d have to do.

 

——————

 

 

He was back in his home.  _His_ home, no matter what Stanley said. He could remember while it was being built, the hidden compartments in the walls, the careful choices about how the walls should look. It reminded him of his past mistakes, the stained glass and the triangular designs, but that didn’t matter, it had been his long before it had Bill’s influence imposed upon it. Living here, in Gravity Falls, meant being able to be open about his  _weirdness_ , by choice. Maybe not everybody would feel a cabin in the woods was freeing, would rather think it was isolating, but that isolation gave him room to breathe.

And Stan had taken it away. There were people in his house all hours of the day, and he couldn’t kick his family out, but the tourists, those didn’t have to be here. He didn’t want to feel like he had to hide here, of all places. Had to put on a face if he ever even wanted to walk through that part of his house for most of the hours of the day, and it was hard to do that when all this stress was making his skin picking issue worse. Not that all his scars from the portal had much help, either. 

Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a piece of silicone, one of the many that his thirty year old bracelet had eventually broken into. Sometimes he thought about replacing the wristband with something more durable, but something about how it eventually broke felt.... Like he deserved it. He recognized that was a bad line of thought to go down, but it was also surprisingly hard to find more bracelets with the same texture- and that weren’t scented or glow in the dark. Those could have.... bad consequences.

 

So he just leaned back against the side of his bed, trenchcoat pulled tight around him as he looked down at the bracelet bit. Everything changed, it seemed. Even if he was so tired of all this change, it seemed nothing could ever be predicted, and maybe... Maybe it was best he just follow along on the ride. It wasn’t like he had much of a choice.


End file.
